This application claims the benefit of Korean Application No. 97-76407, filed Dec. 29, 1997, in the Korean Patent Office, the disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference.
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an information display method on a display device and a device therefor, and more particularly, to a method for scrolling displayed information automatically.
2. Description of the Related Art
Typically, the size of a document displayed on a display device of an information processing system, e.g., a computer, is larger than that of a screen of the display device. In such a case, a user uses up/down/right/left keys and page up/down keys on a key pad or keyboard to move the displayed portion of the total document horizontally or vertically, so that the user sees the whole content of document. Also, in a system which supports a graphic user interface (GUI), a scroll bar may be used to move the displayed portion. The user may manipulate the scroll bar by use of an input device, e.g., a mouse or track ball, so that the displayed document portion is moved horizontally or vertically.
However, in the case that a simple document such as an image or document searched over the world-wide web (WWW) is to be glanced over, the manipulation of the keypad or the scroll bar may be an irksome task to the user. Thus, it is desired that the displayed document is automatically moved horizontally and vertically so that the user can take a glance at the total document.
To solve the above problem, an object of the present invention is to provide an automatic scrolling method for automatically moving a displayed portion of a document to show a document which is larger than a screen of an information device.
Additional objects and advantages of the invention will be set forth in part in the description which follows and, in part, will be obvious from the description, or may be learned by practice of the invention.
To achieve the above and other objects of the present invention, there is provided an automatic scrolling method including the steps of: (a) displaying a portion of the document located at the beginning of the document; (b) displaying another portion of the document shifted from a previously displayed portion by a predetermined horizontal displacement every predetermined period until the right end of the document is displayed; (c) displaying another portion of the document shifted by a predetermined vertical displacement and including a left end of the document when the right end of the document is displayed; and (d) repeating steps (b) and (c) until all of the contents of the document are displayed.
Preferably, the information device is a hand-held portable information terminal.